Lord Ribeiro: My Lords, I declare an interest as a riparian owner. Abstraction is an issue in any area with reservoirs, and particularly with rivers designated as being of special scientific interest. Of equal concern is abstraction for commercial purposes to clean salads. In particular I point to Bakkavör, a company in Alresford, which imports salads from Europe and cleans them, and the water then goes back into the river system. My question to my noble friend the Minister is: what steps can we take to ensure that water that goes back into the river after cleaning processes is of the same quality as the water abstracted in the first place?

Lord Garel-Jones: My noble friend will no doubt be aware of the ruling by the Supreme Court following the 2016 referendum. It stated:
“The legal significance is determined by what Parliament included in the statute authorising it”.
That is that: the Government simply provided for  the referendum to be held, without specifying the consequences. The change in the law required to implement the referendum’s outcome must be made in the only way permitted by the UK constitution—namely, by legislation. Consequently, if Parliament is unable to reach a consensus on any particular deal, is not the logic then that the people should be consulted again?